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US Navy Thwarts Pirate Attack on Tanzanian Ship

Eight pirates captured while trying to escape

By Kevin Spak,  Newser Staff

Posted Feb 23, 2010 4:49 AM CST

(Newser) – A US warship stepped in to defend a Tanzanian ship that was under attack from pirates, scaring off and capturing the scallywags. When the USS Farragut got a distress call from the Tanzanians saying a gang on a skiff was attacking them, a Seahawk helicopter was dispatched to the scene. The pirates fled at the sight of the copter, but it stopped their skiff by firing across its bow.

A boarding team from the Farragut then came aboard the skiff and apprehended eight pirates. The attack was reported today in a statement from the US Embassy in Tanzania. The statement didn’t say where or when the attack took place, but the Farragut is part of the international task force patrolling the Gulf of Aden off the east coast of Somalia, Reuters reports.

US Navy members stop and search a skiff in the Gulf of Aden in this Oct. 15, 2009 file photo.
US Navy members stop and search a skiff in the Gulf of Aden in this Oct. 15, 2009 file photo.   (AP Photo/U.S. Navy, Petty Officer 1st Class Scott Taylor)
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COMMENTS
Showing 3 of 14 comments
bewilderbeast
Feb 25, 2010 12:58 PM CST
A letter I read on the internet (Alternet, I think): For once: An American who looks past the lies the Congress tells him! Who acknowledges that, since the Japanese and Spanish trawlers stole all their fish, the Somalis are left with few options, desperately hungry. -------------------------------------- Thursday, April 23, 2009 06:40 PM PDT They are weak, powerless and small fry.

How can we resist kicking their asses?

We certainly cannot do that to the Pirates on Wall Street, or the Pirates in the Defense Industry, or the Pirates in Congress, or the Pirates in the mainstream media.

We wouldn't want to walk the plank now, would we?

Let's make these poor fishermen who have had their livelihood stolen from them into the greatest evil and threat to the world since Saddam Hussein.

The public is stupid enough to buy that for a dollar.
-- something stinks
bewilderbeast
Feb 25, 2010 12:56 PM CST
Look at the picture: Nine fat heavily armed US sailors with McDonald burgers in their guts, threatening four thin hungry Africans. Go USA!! Way to build your empire - shooting the poor.
bewilderbeast
Feb 25, 2010 12:52 PM CST
What a fine bunch of people on Newser! No, actually ignorant and bigoted. These pirates used to be fishermen, but their country was too poor to patrol their coastline. Trawlers from Spain and Japan and elsewhere stripped them completely bare of fish and they lost their livelihoods. THAT's when they turned to piracy. And your response: The usual fatcat solution: Shoot the Poor!! ---------------------- See: http://www.guardian.co.uk/envi...
 

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